Bill Kristol
Appearances
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
Can't get a lawyer, but it takes out the immigration system so terrible. And he's like the guy, the father-in-law is this big Trump supporter, is a belligerent. They're not going to deport you. If they're going to deport you, they're going to have to come through me.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
which I found particularly, I've got to say, I don't mean to, you know, these are individuals, and I don't know, maybe the quote was out of context. I found particularly infuriating, I must say. You know what? They don't have to come to him. And if ICE wants to deport him, unfortunately, he's not going to, I mean, he's a kind of a prepper. He's got guns and all this kind of stuff.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
So I don't know, maybe he will get in a shootout with some ICE agents, God forbid. But I mean, it's just the whole thing. But anyway, it's a very moving piece about this one DACA recipient. There are 10 million of them. So I'd read that, and look, how did this guy, the father-in-law, come to vote for Trump? And so he describes why he did.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
It's all MAGA lies, MAGA conspiracy theories, wild exaggerations, playing on anxieties that a lot of immigrants have come into that part of Georgia they work in. chicken processing plants and so forth has caused some tensions and problems. But again, sort of like the Ohio thing, wild exaggeration of the problems. He seems in his own life to be doing okay, so far as I can tell.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
And he's got a son-in-law who is actually a DACA recipient. Mitt Romney sort of admires Trump, you can sort of tell from that clip, you know, for bringing in the working class and the middle class. But an awful lot of those people he brought in, he brought in not because he explained that his policies would really help them economically, but
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
It'll be fine. I'm going to be fine. We'll do our best here. I guess there was kind of enough news to talk about for short of whatever happens in the 12 hours until Monday morning.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
He brought them in by appealing to worse than appealing to by magnifying and capitalizing on and amplifying whatever xenophobia and bigotry was there already. I was angry after reading it.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
The looking up to Trump, which is very common. Well, look what he did. It's impressive. Three times nominee, twice winning. Mitt Romney got 47, a little more maybe, percent of the vote against Barack Obama finishing his first term. Pretty impressive. brought the country back from the depths of a terrible recession. Donald Trump got 49.8% of the vote against Kamala Harris succeeding Joe Biden.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I'm going to just stipulate that Barack Obama was a stronger candidate than Kamala Harris, having only 100 days to run after Biden pulled out. Why does Romney even feel defensive? He ran as good a race as Trump. I mean, just empirically, you know, he got two percent less, two and a half percent less. It's not like, you know, he was humiliated, lost the football game 52 to zero. Right.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I mean, he did a little bit less well than Trump. I don't know. I just saw the whole kind of semi admiration and semi almost awe for Trump is very that is it helps Trump, though.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
Yeah, totally. I like fake nicey-nicey shit. That should be the title of this podcast. We denounce fake nicey-nicey shit.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
He's president. He's sort of... Sort of still head of the Democratic Party, not really, but he could, in fact, say some things that would remind people of how dangerous he's been. He knows the executive branch better than anyone else. Well, sort of, or at least once did and still knows some of it.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
He could say a few things that would make Trump's life more difficult, I should think, going forward and show. I mean, I don't know. I tweeted after reading that New York Times piece. I'm so confused. I tweeted, I X'd and blue skied after reading that Times piece because I was so just furious really and moved by the piece, very well reported.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I said, I don't know, can Biden not pardon all the DACA recipients? I suppose he can't. I mean, I don't quite know. Being undocumented isn't really a crime, so it's not like pardoning someone for a crime. On the other hand, I've done zero research on this. I'm just making all this up. Carter did pardon or amnesty, didn't he, all the draft avoiders who had gone to Canada and so forth?
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
Why is it that different to pardon people here and to say, cheat them as if they'd been documented? Anyway, I don't know. Couldn't they be thinking of things they could do to help doing a little more than they're doing to cushion the country from the damage Trump wants to do?
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
So, I mean, Jack is very cautious and judicious. I mean, honestly. a kind of a balanced law professor. Not everything needs to go as badly as it might, but I would say, given that he, I don't know, is a, I would say a touch more conservative than we are, but I think he's, he believes strongly in executive power, but anyway, he knows the executive branch extremely well, both justice and DOD.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
And, uh, Yeah, it's alarming. I think if you know who Jack Goldsmith is, if you know how careful he's been, if I can put it in a simple and crude way, not to sound like us quite over the last two years. And I don't mean this. Jack is a serious guy. It's not like he's sitting around thinking, I don't want to sound like Tim and Bill. It's just that this is who he is.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
But if you know who he is and you watch that, you see that even someone who kind of wants to see whether there might be a case to be made for some of these reforms and civil service stuff and executive authority, and after all, the president is elected and people report to him, he is pretty alarmed.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I'd say especially interesting- In particular, the Schedule F. We didn't get into that quite as much. The thing he seemed personally most alarmed about was national security, interestingly. Fair amount about the rule of law stuff from DOJ, but-
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
Really, the national security implications of having Patel at FBI and then having a DOD that's dysfunctional, I think he's always been somewhat concerned about national security. His work in 2002-2003 was kind of post-9-11 work. It was also rolled back and got in a lot of big fights with the Bush White House by rolling back the Jadu torture memo.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
So he's not some kind of mindless hawk, do as much as you can. But he is seriously concerned about national security, and he's very worried about just what – Four years of these guys being totally silly and demonstrative and just ran. I don't like the FBI, so we're getting rid of the counterintelligence division. How much real damage that could do to our national security.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I mean, he's been reading warning shots, obviously, and also my ex and blue sky feeds. And I've made this point. I don't think it's quite the same in both parties. And I think, honestly, it's the political power side of it that's most scary. I mean, it could be bad to have so much inequality of wealth. It could be more progressive taxes.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
And maybe we need more antitrust to break up companies and all that. In this respect, there's not much similarity between Biden and Trump. I mean, the just totally shameless Elon Musk and Trump and the dealing, as we've seen, the courting favor and appointing, I mean, the meshing, that is more like Orban or aspects of Putin.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
and uh is super dangerous so i'm glad bernie's come around to the bulwark point of view on this you know i wonder if bernie ever used i wonder if he used to use the word oligarchy a lot that was that's sort of a old-fashioned word i don't know if the marxists really use it that much millionaires and the billionaires i mean yeah i don't know we'd have to go back to the to the transcripts from his 16 speeches i don't know it's a good question i guess what i really wanted to play it was um
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
You know, the Democrats, I think, and I'm no expert on this at all, but need to go back and really look at FDR. I mean, they all want to go back to Clinton or they want to go back to Obama, which is understandable. They were in modern America. FDR was an awful long time ago by now. But he combined, I mean, I think of him, I always admired him, grew up admiring him, not knowing that much.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
But, you know, he won the war, obviously, and got us out of the Depression and saved capitalism. That was kind of the standard approach. semi-conservative defense of FDR that unlike, you know, he protected by strengthening guardrails, limiting the abuses and so forth, he actually ended up saving capitalism. And I think FDR said this himself or certainly his defenders did at the time.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
But FDR also used a lot of what would today be called the class warfare rhetoric and denouncing the malefactors of great wealth And had policies that were, in some cases, pretty radical. So I think there's a way to combine a kind of healthy, anti-oligarchic, semi-populism with pretty free market, pro-market, non-huge government program type policies, I think.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I mean, the knock-on effects, the intimidation effects going forward are I mean, this was a very – the lawyers I've talked to, for whatever it's worth, and I think this is the consensus. Trump has lost many lawsuits like this. You don't have to show that every word you say on a television show or on a podcast is literally and absolutely correct.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
All my moderate friends, of course, think, oh, my God, AOC is the face of the party. I've got to say what I've seen her. If you're going to oppose Trump, why not AOC? I don't want her to run the country. I'm not sure I want her to chair some actual important committee if the Democrats ever win Congress back. This is oversight, so it's entirely an oversight of the executive branch.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
It's a, let's call it, adversarial investigative committee. She's not going to be making policy in most areas. So my instinct, Jerry Connolly is incidentally the congressman for right around here, so I'll probably hear from his staff and stuff, but my instinct is to think, why not do AOC? I mean, and people are freaking out on the center about, oh my God, can you imagine AOC?
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
So what if she's head of oversight for two years at the end of the world? And she's pretty good at making these arguments, I think. But what do you think? Don't you have more, I have a little more faith that AOC will go after the worst things the Trump administration does than Jerry Connolly.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
You have to show that you were – first of all, it's not clear that Trump was defamed. I mean, people have never heard this charge before. What are the damages to Trump? But leaving that aside, you would have to show, what, is it reckless disregard? Or, you know, that has to be sort of like Stephanopoulos was cautioned, timid us before the show, don't say the word rape, but he said it.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
Yeah, so just give AOC oversight, and then we'll all support Richie Torres against AOC in the 2028 Democratic primary. It's going to be a good primary, right? Two young members of Congress.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
We're skipping a few generations here. Didn't you get that memo? We're going down. We're going down soon.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I have no secrets and no thoughts except to say, Two people randomly over the last 24 hours, just texting with them or chatting with them, actually, about other things, social, personal, family stuff, have both said, I don't know, it seems like there seems to be something there. And they're not thinking it's some deep state whatever. Aliens. Yeah, aliens, right. So I don't know.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I haven't followed it enough. It feels like there's maybe enough that isn't literally just airplanes landing at Newark and at LaGuardia, or maybe it is literally just airplanes and FedEx drones or Amazon drones delivering stuff. Maybe it is literally that.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
If that's in the deposition documents, I doubt it is, then maybe ABC was right to cave and pay $15 million to the Trump library, which doesn't exist yet, I guess, and $1 million of legal fees. But this kind of, as you say, preemptive capitulation... is just terrible. I mean, Disney has a very big legal department. They have access to extremely good law firms.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
If they felt they could defend this, I think every other, not just broadcast entity, but other places that have people who are discussing Trump on any medium, I'm thinking about university councils, the chilling effect will be
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
very great which is the whole point of these civil lawsuits and it does remind one i think some smart people said this a few months ago a few weeks ago when we were all correctly very upset about cash patel at the fbi it's not only the criminal things he could do from the fbi it's the civil lawsuits that trump and elon musk and peter teal and everyone can fund they to try to bankrupt people intimidate people and they got they've already gone after our friend olivia troy they've gone after others and
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
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The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I don't know. I worry that now it's going to be just open the floodgates. I will also point out, finally, it turns out that Susie Wiles, the incoming White House chief of staff, had dinner with the head of ABC News Monday night at Mar-a-Lago.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
I was in touch with a scholar of, like Ann Applebaum, a different person, but a scholar of European politics and of Hungary. Orban did a lot of this in Hungary. And of course, Trump's tried to do it over the years. The American system isn't that friendly to defamation suits for public figures, and he's lost almost everyone. But Orban shut down plenty, or
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
gained control or certainly intimidated opposition media in Hungary. And one I've been saying, you've been saying, I think, well, US isn't Hungary. Let's not overdo this. It's not going to be that easy to intimidate everyone in the US and use the legal system in the US the way Orban used it in Hungary. But here we are. And again, this isn't even a Trump-appointed judge doing anything.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
This is the company. Again, not just going into hiding a little bit, maybe dragging out the case and not making a robust defense of free speech. This is conspicuously and visibly paying up before the inauguration. I mean, this is paying protection money or whatever. And it just, the message it sends to everyone else is not only do you have to not offend Trump, you need to pony up.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
And indeed, aren't they ponying up for the inaugural committee now, all these billionaires?
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
What would the damages have been? It would not have been much more than $15 million. I mean, how much damage did this interview with Nancy Mays do to Donald Trump's reputation, given that he lost the civil case against D.G. and Carol? You don't have to make a big deal. Disney doesn't have to go to Soapbox. ABC doesn't have to go to Soapbox.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
They just say, look, we're going to let this go to the judge. We're going to take depositions. You know, we want this. We hope it works out quickly. And we're not trying to make a point here. But we defend our people when they say something in good faith. They didn't have to grandstand on behalf of free speech.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
But again, this is a whole different world from just quietly litigating the case and maybe giving a million dollars to the Trump inaugural fund, right? This is a very conspicuous situation. unnecessary preemptive collapse on a core first amendment issue. Yeah.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
For me personally, just reading about it last night, I felt the worst I've felt since November 5th. I felt the most ominous fire bell in the night or whatever term you want since November 5th. Obviously, the appointments of the nominations of Patel and other things are pretty bad and ominous and other things Trump and his people have said. But I felt like this was really a moment.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
It's not just that they're going to try to do things in the government they shouldn't do. It's that the whole, And what's not the government, corporate America, civil society, if you want to use a fancy term, is preemptively capitulating. You can have a government that's bad, and that's bad, obviously.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
But if everyone else is kind of not going along with their attempts to intimidate, there's probably certainly some ways limited damage they could do and other ways they could do great damage versus the government of the United States. But still, this really, I think, just takes it to another level in terms of civic or social damage. Yeah.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
God forbid he actually announced that he's going to try to do something. Maybe not within the Republican Party, because I share his pessimism about that. but in other areas to build up a non-MAGA agenda for the country, a liberal centrist agenda, or recruit young candidates to it. I mean, something, right? I mean, if he wants to retire, I guess that's fine. But again, why doesn't he retire?
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
Just stand by his previous comments. Does he really have to say, well, I've worked with J.D. Vance since then and stuff? Really? What have they been working on there in the Senate? I don't know.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
You sent me a couple of quotes from Romney. I hadn't watched anything this morning and hadn't even known he was on these shows. And the other one, I think, was that you have to admit that Trump has brought in the middle class and the working class to the Republican Party, something like that.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
And I read that just as I had finished reading a New York Times article, big New York Times article, which is online, I assume in today's print times. Eli Zaslow, the reporter, I think, was from Georgia. Very moving about a guy who's been here since he was five years old, family, hard worker, churchgoer, wonderful person, undocumented. His mother came across the border to work in Georgia.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
She also seems to have been, maybe both parents, I can't remember, were hard workers. He married a girl from Rome, has a father-in-law who voted for Trump. And it's caused some strains because he's very worried. They're very worried about him being deported and they're spending money on lawyers. They don't have that much extra, any extra money.
The Bulwark Podcast
Bill Kristol: Fake Nicey-Nicey Sh**t
And it's causing just terrible psychological distress on them and their little kids. The father-in-law is sort of, well, I'm, You're not the kind of person they want to deport. And so according to the article, the 40-year-old or so DACA recipient, Dreamer Type, says, well, I don't know. He says he wants to deport us, and I have to prepare for that in case it were to happen. But what do I do?